The West Africa Ebola outbreak (2014-2016): a Health Intelligence failure?

Abstract

ABSTRACTThe role of health intelligence (HI) has received little assessment in the West African Ebola outbreak (2014-2016). Using newly declassified information on the outbreak, this research finds significant HI problems that hindered an appropriate response to the outbreak. The Guinean government’s low capacity to deal with the crisis, the government’s misleading assessments of the crisis, the US embassy’s failure to contextualize the information properly in terms of the risks the virus posed, and the US embassy’s willingness to accept the Guinean government’s assessment without criticism were contributing factors in the HI failure in the opening months of the Ebola outbreak.